Jan 19, 2015

Are You A Technophobe? Shame on You

I was blown away when I read an article posted in the NYT's this weekend called Older Job Seekers Find Ways to Avoid Age Bias. The Times writer wrote about people approaching retirement that were still seeking supplemental income. We all know the trouble that age group has finding fulfilling work. It seems that those very workers cannot find employment in part because they are perceived as "technophobic". Yikes! This is what the article said that caught my interest:

A lack of technology aptitude is a common worry. “People over 60 are often perceived as technophobes,” said Nancy Collamer, a career coach and author of “Second-Act Careers: 50+ Ways to Profit From Your Passions During Semi-Retirement.” To overcome age bias, demonstrate comfort with technology and social media, Ms. Collamer said. “Include your LinkedIn URL on your résumé, or mention an interesting article you found on the employer’s Twitter feed during an interview.”

I know that there are younger people that are not keeping up with the technology available today. In this day and age you cannot even belong to a church group without having an email address so how they manage to lag behind I have no idea. The Times article is a wonderful source of information for people seeking a new job interest at an age when it all seems very hard. They pointed out that more education or training may be necessary and that volunteer work can lead to a paying job. But being or claiming to be a "technophope" is not cool and in the end may be a persons undoing.

4 comments:

I know!!! Can you imagine my surprise when people don't even have one of those? I have three email addresses and seldom look at any of them. I get text messages notification for most things and follow family/friends on Facebook. My Twitter account is purely for blogging I suppose. And I am not THAT young. However, if I want to communicate with my children and grandchildren I need to be able to do what they do.

But I will say that I fiddle around with the technology a lot and when I really do need help, I know what I am on about. I see this as the same as learning to write or doing math...it is essential in todays world.

I may be a closet technophobe on principle. It seems to take on a "keeping up with the Joneses" mentality with the number of accounts, followers, likes, re-tweets, etc. When call display first appeared, I saw people run up a flight of stairs to check the phone display to see who was calling vs answering the extension within arms reach. With all the forms of communication, there seems to be less quality communication taking place. Among some of my closest friends, conversation and work and fun times interrupted by one or another as a beep or vibration is answered. For what? - something fairly trivial that could wait. It seems to me that unless you're waiting for an organ transplant, the funeral service need not be interrupted by ringing, buzzing and vibrating cell phones! Like everything, this communication technology needs to be managed. I just see too many people get swallowed up in the abyss, then complain of noooo time, being soooo busy and soooo tired and soooo distracted. Don't all these devices have an off button?

Oh I agree totally. In fact, because I have had all this "stuff" for so long I have a sense of when to check on things and do not get beeping on my phone constantly.

However, if you are hunting for a job in retirement to supplement your income, you need to at least appear to be knowledgeable. The perception that young people have of you as a technophobe can be a roadblock to getting employed when you are older.